Monday, January 31, 2005

work is going to be busy busy this week. I'll try to keep up with posting/knitting.

Didn't do too much knitting this weekend. I did a lot of staining and varnishing of a recent craigslist purchase though :) Last night I came upon this entry from Autumnsnowdust's blog. I had never thought much of the ruffles scarf, but this scarf looks amazin in the colors she chose and with a simple black tank. It's not the ruffles pattern. It's actually a very simple pattern at knitters review.

Basically cast on 90 sts
row 1: knit
row 2: bar increase every stitch
repeat these two rows two more times and finish with a knit row (row 7), bind off...
The pattern called for size 13 needles which I happily used until the 6th row and all the increases didn't fit on one needle, so I put as much as i could on one needle, put a rubberband around the top to keep the stitches from slipping off, and continued knitting onto a third size 13 needle. I just need to bind off now, but I'll do that later when I catch a break. I'll post pics tomorrow.

Saturday, January 29, 2005

It's been sunny over here with spots of showers. And I've been feeling much better! Thank you all for your good wishes. And Thank you Secret Pal for the pick me up note! What a lovely flower! It was a great morning surprise.

On Friday I was busy running around between the psych dept and business school trying to get all my work done (which I did, yay!... well, at least for the day). I was trying to whiz through my stuff so I could make it over to Uncommon Threads in Los Altos which was having a sale (15% off all yarns plus 30% off some specially picked out yarns). Since the shop closed at 5:30pm I had to rush through my day. I did finish most of my stuff by 3:30pm, and I headed over for some unhealthy healthy yarn petting.

Uncommon Threads ReviewThis was the second LYS I've ever been to (the first being The Knitter's Studio in Menlo Park). It was a sale day, so this may not be as relevant to a normal shopping experience. Unlike the Knitter's Studio which is organized by color not yarn brand or type, Uncommon Threads had all of its yarns separated by brand (Rowan, Debbie Bliss, Jamieson, Crystal Palace, Plymouth etc) and within the brand, by type (kidsilk haze, biggy print, cork... can you tell what brand of yarn I was looking at??). Yarns are piled on bookshelves with big tags under them labeling the brand and yarn name which was INCREDIBLY helpful to locate certain yarns quickly. Items knitted in a specific yarn were placed next to that yarn for an easy view of how each knitted up.

Needles were on twirly stands (Addis, Clover, Susan Bates). And there were a multitude of buttons that I breezed by since I'm not much of a button gal. There was also a whole section for baby yarns that I breezed by (don't know anyone with babies yet...). In the back of the store was a long table with chairs where patrons could look at pattern books. The store always had a store copy of each knitting mag, extras were for purchase, and you could put your name down to be notified when a mag came in.

I had heard that the women who run the shop were a little unapproachable, luckily this was not my experience. Maybe due to it being a sale day, but the shop workers approached customers to see if they could be of any help. Customers can use straw baskets (available for purchase) to carry their yarn purchases around the store. I did not find these as readily available at the Knitters Studio, but I may not have looked very hard.

One thing for future notice is that on their sale days, they really do have limited stock of their good sale items. Many Debbie Bliss yarns were on sale, but most of the best colors had already been snatched up by the time I got there. Also, the 15% off normal priced items also applied to knitting magazines and needles, basically anything in the store (which was good).

I got 2 balls of Debbie Bliss Merino Aran in a sandy color and 3 balls of Debbie Bliss Merino Chunky in a light blue color. I picked up my first pair of Addi Turbos Size 7! I'm so excited to try these since I've heard such good things about them. I also picked up some Susan Bates size 35 straights (would have gotten them in Addi's but I couldn't justify spending $20 on needles I wouldn't use very often) to use for Beau (in Rowan BJGB).

In other news, I finished the pair of armwarmers for my cousin's bday and gave them to her today:

Friday, January 28, 2005

yeah. i don't know what i ate, but yesterday I stayed home from work in the morning because I had food poisoning the night before... or something. I was sick much of the night before. ick factor. And I had a headache that pounded like Taiko.

But I'm all better now, just a little busy. Both my part time jobs have been pulling for my time this week.

Today I made a trip to evil Walmart at my boss's request. I needed to pick up some cheap fabric for the walls of our experiment room. The whole time going through walmart, all these looming signs with amazingly cheap prices jumped at me. I think it was frightening really.

The woman in front of me at the cutting table was buying a lot of flower printed fabric. Trying to make conversation, I asked what she would be making with it. As it turns out, she was sending all the fabric back home to her family on an island in Guam to make clothes for themselves. What a sad state of things is that? I nearly cried right there. It was also humbling to hear the sales associates talk about what they could eat for dinner on their breaks. One of them had brought bread and butter to share with the other for dinner. I reflected on all the leftovers ervy and I hadn't been able to finish this week, and I felt ashamed at our waste.

totally switching topics: knittingI discovered that I really like the Rowan Big Just Got Bigger pattern for Beau Capelet. Now I didn't think I was a fan of capelets, but I now think it really depends on what you pair it with (clothing wise). It can look quite nice. So I'm making a trial capelet. I may frog it if I hate it tho.

Tuesday, January 25, 2005

I got 15 oz of Red Brown Sheep Wool for Spinning for $9.99 plus shipping from Oregon*Trail*Yarn. She has some other 15 oz dutch auctions for some blue streaked roving also from Brown Sheep Company. Looks like fun extra fiber to have around.

Also, thanks to Jessica of Fig & Plum I visited ebay seller 4to4 who has Rowan kidsilk haze on sale for $9 a ball with free shipping!!! I got two balls one in color Candy Girl one in color Lord. This is major stash enhancement for me :)

forgive me, I'm not very good at questionnaires, maybe that's why i avoid doing those memes.

1. Are you a yarn snob (do you prefer high- and/natural fibers)? Do you avoid Red Heart and Lion Brand? Or is it all the same to you?I'm not a yarn snob. I adore high end fibers, but I also use lion brand for projects. I am fine with acrylic as long as it's soft and cuddly.

2. Do you spin? Crochet?I spin on an Ashford Traditional Wheel.3. Do you have any allergies? (smoke, pets, fibers, perfume, etc.)I don't like smoke, and I'm allergic to pollen... so I guess it's best if I don't have yarn that's been rolling around in a bed of flowers :-P

4. How long have you been knitting?2 years, but I've really gotten going this past year.

8. What other crafts or Do-It-Yourself things do you like to do?Sew, make cards, origami, make jewelry

9. What kind of music do you like? Can your computer/stereo play MP3s? (if your buddy wants to make you a CD)indie bands. some of my favs are Death Cab for Cutie, Postal Service, The Tragically Hip, Beulah, Mates of State, The New Pornographers, and The Shins.
so if it sounds along those lines, I'll probably like it.

10. What's your favorite color? Or--do you have a color family/season/palette you prefer?That's really hard... It depends on my mood. Right now, I'm loving bright colors (must be a winter thing) as they cheer me up so much. But I also like muted colors. I wear a lot of blue, but I'm also one of those that thinks that orange is underused in everything. Basically, I like all colors.

11. What is your family situation? Do you have any pets?I live with my boyfriend and a kitty named Asha and a guinea pig named Mesquite (skeeter)

12. What are your life dreams? (really stretching it here, I know)there are two sets of dreams,
in one dream i go to psych grad school and get my phD in Social Psych and become a collegee professor at a small college making my parents, grandparents and whole lineage pround and satisfied that I have done something substantial in my life.
in dream two, I work at home and hold another part time job while I concentrate on making crafts and selling yarn and clothes and accessories.

13. What is/are your favorite yarn/s to knit with? hm... I don't think I've tried enough to be able to say, but I've really enjoyed anything soft... I really liked knitting the merino from handpaintedyarn.com

14. What fibers do you absolutely *not* like?scratchy fibers

15. What is/are your current knitting obsession/s?armwarmers and hats.

16. What is/are your favorite item/s to knit?armwarmers

17. What are you knitting right now?a sock, armwarmers, 2 scarves, a hat, a lace bookmark, etc.

18. What do you think about ponchos?I like a lot of em, but I also dislike a lot of them. I'm going to make the harlot poncho..

24. What is your favorite animated character or a favorite animal/bird?Gir from Invader Zim... or Puss in Boots from Shrek 225. What is your favorite holiday?Christmas and New Years, its the one where everyone gets the most time off

Monday, January 24, 2005

This weekend I was RAOK'd TWICE! Stacey sent me a gift certificate from Adagio Teas! I've been wanting to try their Oolong teas so this is absolutely perfect!

Then on Sunday, I was surprised again with another RAOK. Kathy sent me a gift certificate to World Wide Chocolate. MMmmmmm.... chocolate. I spent last night looking through all the chocolates online before bed... which of course made me crave chocolate all night. *drool* Thanks Kathy!

knittingdespite some random back spasm-y problems this weekend, I actually got a lot done.

I finished knitting my pastor hat, but I found that it is really for someone with a large head (ie it fits ervy). I'll send it along, but I also knit up a second hat to send to Stacey for the pastor. Here are both of them, as modeled by gir.

This stuffed gir, btw, has an enormous head, which is why these hats fit quite well on him. He is the largest of the three that I gave to ervy for his birthday.

Since ervy's been on such a tea kick (thanks to Alton Brown), I also bought him a small teapot to bring to work. Alton recommended cast iron tea pots, but since those would break my budget, I bought ervy a little black porcelain tea pot. This weekend I finished his gifty and made his teapot a cozy (based off of the knitty teapot cozy). One side says:

the other side says:

Because it's not just any geek's teapot... it's EVAN's teapot. yeah that's right! of course being me, I was going to put "ervy" on that other side instead of "evan," but apparently ervy's friend jaap likes to tease him about being called ervy... *wave... HI JAAP!*

Here's the back of the cozy for good measure. I'm not quite sure how it is supposed to be tied in back, so I just threaded through the holes, and this is what I got.

I have been contemplating making a pair of socks. I know there's a simple pattern in Weekend knitting (which i own), so I may check that out. I realize i need to get some smaller dpns and some sock yarn before I try this out... hmmm... knitpicks yarn? I've been holding off buying from them, but it's just so tempting! Of course, I still have quite a few other knitting projects planned, so I may stick this sock idea on the back burner.

spinning

I spun up three yarns this weekend I am quite happy with. I spun up these two garden inspired yarns on Friday:

I had bought the CUTEST bees, dragonflies, and ladybugs buttons at michaels during their dollar sale, and I had planned to ply them with the yarn... But woe is me... I sadly found that despite the buttons' small sizes, they could not fit through the orifice on my flyer. So I ended up returning all the buttons *le sigh*

with the last single of canary yellow, I spun up Birdie:

I like her a lot!

I'm waiting on some fiber I won on ebay 3 weeks ago! I finally emailed the seller last week, and apparently, their shipment wasn't in, and they had listed the fiber thinking it was coming in. So as of Saturday, my fiber still hasn't SHIPPED! I'm a little peeved. I'd heard good things about this ebay seller, so I don't think this is representative of their practice, but since this is the first time I'm dealing with them, I'm extra aggravated.

random

Ervy's birthday was nice. I brought him lunch at his work, and got to see his new floor/cube. Adam, Paulie, and Emi were taking off for the weekend for Tahoe, so we celebrated on ervy's real birthday. We went out to dinner at Sichuan Delight and had lots of tasty spicy food.

Friday night, I had a craving for fried chicken. Not knowing where to get good fried chicken around here, Ervy, Fu, and I headed out to Armadillo Willy's. On our way there, Fu called us. He was frightened by the Armadillo Willy's parking lot, and suggested Marie Callendars instead. Now, see, I used to go to Marie Callendars as a child with my family, and I remembered it fondly/nostalgically.... all that has been dreadfully trashed. Marie Callendars was dark and depressing, and the food was really icky... way too much butter (I know that sounds like it could be a good thing, but trust me... umm... no). I felt really sick afterwards. So feeling sick, we rented Super Size Me, and watched the narrator get sick on McDonald's. Good movie btw :)

Last night ervy and I made one of the tastiest meals EVER! I made poached fish in a spicy tomato sauce with garlic toast. Ervy made Camarones al Diablo from Rick Bayless's tv show (Mexico one plate at a time) and a fresh lettuce salad with Mexican cheese.

Everything was beautiful, and the flavors were perfect. The shrimp was spicy, but buttery and sweet at the same time! The fish was refreshing and light. The salad was fresh and crunchy and went perfectly with the salty mexican cheese.

Thursday, January 20, 2005

*whoa* while typing that I got ambushed by girl scouts at my house selling expensive cookies. But since I remember being a girl scout (all the way through high school I might add), I ordered 2 boxes. 1 samoas 1 tagalog.

I would like to note that I would have posted the war president collage if it weren't for ervy's bday today. I knew i was going to wish him happy birthday, and an unhappy inaugaration isn't gonna stop me!

knitting update

VOILA!

I reveal Sophie with beaded handle!!

The beads are all glass, plus a few swarovski crystals thrown in for good measure (ok it's really for the wonderful sparkle in the light... ooh sparkles). I bought the hand grommet tool from Joanns over the weekend. i was a complete idiot I completely forgot about the 50% off coupon i had gotten in the mail for that weekend. so I payed a ghastly $17. But I'm happy to report that I LOVE the hand grommet tool. I've used the hammer ones, and I found this to be much much easier to use. For loops, I made silver spirals out of heavy gauge wire and hammered them flat to attach the handle to the bag.

My pastor hat is almost done... I had planned to do the aran hat from the knit a day calendar, but I realized it might be too girly, guys seem to like these beanie hats better... so here it is... well almost.

Here's my Musique scarf on the needles, neglected. Poor thing, I just keep finding projects that need to be finished before it. The funny thing about this is that Delia my knitting twin also just bought the musique yarn (in a sandy color scheme) to do an instant gratification scarf. I think she must be somehow reading my knitting to do list...

I'm almost done with one of the armwarmers for my cousin's birthday... see!

I've also learned how to yo and ssk (celebrate the little things right?). I got to use both knitting a lace bookmark, I forgot to take a photo of it, so y'all can just pretend you see it... you DO see it RIGHT?!!

Wednesday, January 19, 2005

knittingI pulled all my stuff together and made it to one of the Stanford knitting group's (the Knit Wits) lunch meetings. Today it met in the CSRE department, and I stopped in to see my friend Chris Queen who had originally told me about the knitwits. She has something like tendonitus in her elbows and she hasn't been able to knit since christmas (I think I should knit her something in sympathy, any suggestions?).

The group was smaller than the group that met at Nathania's for the knit in. There were only eight of us in the CSRE library. There are multiple groups that meet all over campus though (Why can't they be like the San Jose State Stitch and Bitch and have one large group?). There's actually another meeting tomorrow in the education building.

I've decided that I LOVE knitting with other people. Spinnity really knows what she's talking about. Knitting groups are the BEST. I got to show off my finished Sophie bag complete with sparkly beaded handle (another girl was working on the French Market Bag), I taught someone how to cast on, and I was invited as a guest to attend a Black Sheep Guild meeting down here on the penninsula. I have been contemplating visiting this group. There are handweavers, dyers, spinners, etc. Sounds like fun.

BTW, Nathania posted more pics of the knit in here. I can't emphasize enough how much fun I had. It was a shame I had to leave early, but my friends had planned to see Appleseed (an anime in theaters, but dubbed here in america) that night. Also check out the awesome brownies that Nancy brought, not only were they tasty, but they made for a great story.

randomervy and i had a lovely anniversary last night. I made enchiladas, and he made margaritas. He also brought fresh raspberries, apple, and banana along with two humongous chunks of Scharfenberger dark chocolate for fondue. It was the BEST fondue I've ever had! And it went lovely with a bottle of champagne to celebrate the evening.

Tuesday, January 18, 2005

And it's linked up with both my blogger and livejournal. Speaking of livejournal, I think I may have abandoned my food journal. I know this, because I've posted food related stuff on this journal... I've just mainly decided that I like my blogger better than my lj. I still follow many of my lj communities (mostly via bloglines), and my lj friends page (don't ask why I haven't hooked that up with bloglines... some how, it's just more manageable not to).

knitting

Thank you everyone for your kind wishes for my grandmother. I thought about all your kind words as I knitted my grandma 2 hats over the weekend.

One hat is a k2p2 rib in blue wool ease thick and quick, and the other hat is a white hat in carons simply soft with thick and quick intarsia. I realize I should have taken the picture straight on so that the intarsia character wouldn't be so crunched, but oh well. These hats are off in the mail today so grandma should have a warm head in a couple days.

The knit in on Friday at Nathania's house was excellent! I had so much fun, and I finally met a few of the bloggers I read! I did not bring my camera, because I am a bad blogger, but Nancy and Jewel did! You can see their pics of the event on their sites. There was lots of yummy food and great knitting. I was so inspired by these amazing knitters with major sweaters on the needles! Check out Spinnity's neat socks (there's a pic on Nancy's blog) that she wore to the knit in. I loved the bright colors, and I think that is the most I've looked at anyone's feet ever!

I tried to visit Creative Hands yesterday (I was craving a yarn shop, and we were heading north, otherwise I would have wanted to check out the one in Saratoga), but it was closed. To date I have only been to one real yarn shop (not a michaels or joanns or online retailer), the one in menlo park that i can't remember the name of off hand.

Sunday, January 16, 2005

Ervy and I went over to my parents house last night to celebrate ervy's birthday (the real day is next Thursday, but my family will be out of town).

When we got there we found out that my grandma hasn't been feeling well for the past 4-5 days. She's taking that chinese black medicine stuff that is supposedly a cure-all, so I hope she gets better soon. She hasn't been sick in a long time, and I always worry about her.

As it turns out she's been looking for a hat to keep her head warm at night when she sleeps. My mom saw the hats ervy and I were wearing that I had made, and told me about my grandma's search for a hat. So of course, I've moved my grandma's knit hat to the top of my priority list. I'm hoping to finish two hats by tuesday so I can mail them home. My grandma asked for a white hat, but her favorite color is blue. So I think I'll make her both a white and a blue hat.

Still I have a problem with knitting a plain white hat. It just looks so stark, so I was trying to think of a nice intarsia pattern I could knit in. I decided on the Chinese character for longevity. Of course I couldn't find any color charts for that when I searched, so I made my own. Here are my two versions.

I think I'm going to knit the first one. I like how it came out better.

Saturday, January 15, 2005

Friday, January 14, 2005

quick blogging, gotta run to the store to pick up stuff to make curry for tonight's potluck... i hope people like curry... need to make rice...

knitting

last night i was continued knitting at the hat for the pastor, thanks to the knitting lj community, my questions were answered about the pattern.

then around 10pm, i started thinking how sad it was that my ervy was so cold all day yesterday. He deserved a hat too! I had picked up a bunch of wool ease thick and quick in pumpkin color (they were on sale 50% off at michaels because i guess the seasonal color is out). So I made ervy a Life Aquatic hat like Ned's. I didn't finish before ervy left for work tho. My fingers and arms are sore from knitting like a maniac. Anyway, here's the hat:

and me modeling the hat. It's a bit too large for me, but it fits ervy's head nicely (he's got a monster sized noggin')

Thursday, January 13, 2005

adam, emi, paulie, fu, ervy, and i caught a late 10:55pm showing last night. (wow i love that all my friends have blogs that i can link to!).

Some where we had heard that people didn't like Life Aquatic, but we thoroughly enjoyed it. I especially loved 1) all the orange/red hats, 2) the fun rendered animals, 3) the dollhouse style shooting of the ship.

Before hand we ate at Machu Pichu, my favorite Peruvian restaurant, in San Mateo. I still have nummy Carapulcra leftovers for lunchy (it's a pork and chicken stew with peruvian potatoes and rice). I need to look up a recipe for that somewhere... There's one here. Where do i get freeze dried potatoes? Here's a recipe for Aji de Gallina that looks tasty.

OK, and what was up with the temperture last night in the Bay Area? It was soooooo cold. I was glad I had my fleece, strawberry hat, and arm warmers, but i was still cold! Yeah yeah, i know, typical californian. It gets a little chilly and I'm freakin' out. It's not like it's snowing, but I really can't take seasons. I really just am unable to handle extreme cold or heat. I'm a weinie.

knitting

Thanks for the lovely comments on my strawberry hat and yarn. Asha the kitty also loves the pom poms on the end of my new hat. Whenever I bend over she gives them a good WHACK! My friend emi also likes playing with the pom poms. Anyone up for a game of tetherball around my head?

I forgot to do the celebratory post for the strawberry hat and sophie. I've been seeing it all over the knit blogosphere. Well, pretend the title to my post yesterday was MY FIRST FO'S OF 2005!!!!.

I've got the next knitting projects laid out.
1. knit armwarmers for my cousin's bday
2. knit black hat for pastor to send to stacey for a request made my a fellow blogger, a pastor, for some knit hats. She's collecting them to send to him and his congregation.
3. finish a scarf i started in houston
4. knit a scarf with my purply blue handspun

Here's a pic of the armwarmers I started for my cousin. She goes to Stanford so I figured a nice close to cardinal red would be good.

I wanted to use a pattern from my knitting pattern a day calendar for the hat for the pastor, but I'm a little confused by it. It's the Jan 10 &11 pattern (for those of you who have the calendar) and it looks like this (I blurred out the pattern part for copyright reasons.

For those of you who have the calendar, there's a Pattern A and a Pattern B, do you knit those in the same row? or is it a choice, you use either Pattern A for the entire hat, or pattern B for the entire hat? I've also never done T3B or T3F, and I had to look up what it meant. For my future reference there's this nice knitting abbreviations page. I did cast on for the hat, and knitted 3 rows, and then I realized that although I thought I had been careful not to twist the fabric, I had twisted it as is a common problem when knitting in the round; although it's the first time it's happened to me.

And finally, a picture of the roving I got in the mail yesterday.
The seller said she thought it was from brown sheep (she bought it on sale at a shop that was closing). The colors remind me of a cal poly scrunchie and ex gave me once. If I knew someone at cal poly, these would spin up to make some excellent plyed yarn for a scarf. It's actually quite nice roving. I spun up some of the yellow yesterday. The fiber is nice and soft, and feels good running through my hands.

random questiondo any of your cats bite their nails? My kitty bites her nails while she's cleaning her paws. I personally think she is trying to sharpen them into daggers. I trim her claws every week, and the next week they're still sharp little talons!

Wednesday, January 12, 2005

knittingsophie has been felted. This is the first felted item i've ever made. Honestly, I was holding my breath wondering if it would work. I knew the yarn i used was 100% wool, but it was recycled from a sweater I found thrifting, so I didn't know if it was superwash or anything.

Of course had I swatched, I could have found out, but I put that off, deciding I could always sew a fabric lining if it didn't felt...

anyway, here she is, sans handles... I still need a grommet punch to finish her :)

I also finished the strawberry hat as seen here modeled by the lovely blue stuffy.

Honestly, it's much cuter on the stuffy than on me. I look sort of toolish. I'm going to blame it on lack of makeup.

spinningHere's one of the yarns I spun up yesterday. Her name is Fire and Brimstone. She's plyed with singles from the fire roving I posted earlier and the elvira hair roving. Stuffy's foot got in the way of my picture...

The second yarn I spun is drying, I'll post it tomorrow along with pics of my new green and yellow roving that came in the mail today! Yippee for wool!

randomI made the best cinnamon quickbread/cake thing yesterday. Ervy LOVED it. He said it's like the one his grandma used to make, except it's better! Hear that?! Better'n gramma's cake. Woohoo!
I used a recipe from allrecipes.com, altered slightly. I was going to use the recipe for Orange Cinnamon Coffeecake that Julie posted. Her pic of her coffeecake is gorgeous!, but I have no oranges for zest, and I was too lazy to go to the store.

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Line one 9x5 inch loaf pan with parchment paper on bottoms and sides.
2. Measure flour, 1 cup sugar, baking powder, baking soda, 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon, salt and mix together.
3. Mix together buttermilk, oil, eggs and vanilla in a separate mixing bowl.
4. Combine dry and wet ingredients slowly, and mix until just combined.
5. Pour 1/2 of batter into prepared loaf pan.
6. Combine 2 tablespoons white sugar, 2 tablespoons brown sugar, 2 teaspoons cinnamon and butter, mixing until crumbly.
7. Sprinkle 1/2 of topping over smoothed batter in pan. Pour rest of batter into pan and smooth the top. Sprinkle the rest of the topping over the top of the batter. Using knife, cut in a light swirling motion to give a marbled effect.
8. Bake for about 50 minutes. Test with toothpick. When inserted it should come out clean. Remove bread from pan to rack to cool. Take off parchment paper from sides and bottom of bread.
9. Make your favorite powder sugar icing to drip over the top (optional). I whisked powdered sugar and milk together to get a nice consistency and dripped it over the bread while it was cooling on the rack. Be sure to catch drippings on wax paper or foil to avoid making your counter sticky.

This is so yummy! I'm hoping to make a second loaf to bring to nathania's knit in on friday.

Tuesday, January 11, 2005

your friend wants to see life aquatic, and your first reaction is, "oh that's the one with that orange knitted seaman cap" and you think, I still need to knit myself one of those.

Sophie is felting. My strawberry/(tomato looking) hat is almost completed.

randomFriday evening, our dishwasher blew one of our circuits out, so we lost power in half the apartment. Yesterday the electrician came and replaced the breaker, so I can finally do all the dishes and clean up the house! Yay, the mess was driving me insane!

I saw Sideways finally this past weekend. We were going to see La Mala Educacion (the new almodovar movie), but Paulie wanted to see something lighthearted, and I was afraid Sideways would go away soon since it's been out for so long.

The theater was packed! We did choose geriatric time, (4:15 show on a saturday and everyone was getting senior discounts while we dished out $9.25 each... wah. where's the student discount?). I really enjoyed the movie. Like I stated on my food blog awhile ago, it was especially nice for me since the main character disses on merlot about as much as I do. And he loves pinot noir! After the movie, we (ervy, fu, paulie, and I) were in quite a wine-y mood.

We headed off to Whole Foods and BevMo, and we bought lots of tasty cheeses, bread, olives, a yummy duck moose pate, wine, mushrooms and scallops. We started off with a pinot noir (of course), but as we moved through the meal to the bacon wrapped scallops and wild mushroom fettucine, we drank a nice sweet reisling that Paulie's sister had brought him from a wine tasting trip in Oregon. We also watched John Cleese's Wine For the Confused that Paulie had recorded on his TiVo in October of last year. If you can find a copy of the episode (aired on food tv). I highly recommend it. It is not only informative, but quite QUITE amusing. And Brendan Fraiser (sp?) makes several wine appearances. My favorite part was when he went to an austrailian winery, and said he had to dress down. He then proceeded to rub dirt on his clothes before he entered.

Sunday Night we had a Fry things party which consisted of fusons deep fryer, lots of panko, calamari, oysters, tatertots, and mochi. On the non fryed side, we had some of Fu's tasty jambalaya and watched Maria Full of Grace which I had wanted to catch in theaters. Apparently, I was the only one who knew what the movie was going to be about. Everyone thought Maria was eating marshmallows on the title screen. Silly peoples. Btw, the movie fulfilled my expectations. I thought it was done well, and really relayed a story of colombian drug mules that wasn't set out to frighten or exagerate or hollywoodize, but tell it as it is, with all the dangers involved wrapped in.

In other news, I got my first jury summons. I was quite surprised, and I almost tossed the envelope to the junk mail pile before I noticed it was from the Superior Courts of San Mateo County. Getting jury summons makes me feel old. I've always looked at it as something adults get, and since I barely think of myself as an adult, it was quite suprising to get my jury notice.

This mustard has made my lunch sandwiches extra tasty
We brought it back from france, but we're gonna search for something tasty and equivalent over here when we finish it. Yum!! The curry mustard from france also makes me quite happy :)